Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Science Expertise as a Legitimacy Basis for Lawmaking and Additional Bases of Legitimacy

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Science-Based Lawmaking

  • 327 Accesses

Abstract

The main argument for a science-based lawmaking model versus an absolute democratic lawmaking model is the effectiveness that the first type of model will most probably demonstrate in comparison with the latter regarding environmental regulation. Scholars over the years have strongly doubted that democracy can effectively serve environmental protection goals. As a result, they have called for different forms of governance. International, regional and national institutions mainly base their success on their reliance on expertise and not on political bodies. For example, according to several analysts, the regulatory success of the European Communities lies in large measure in the relative insulation of the “Eurocrats” from the electoral cycles and the political considerations, which dominate national policy making. How is it possible to bridge democracy and effectiveness? How could the international environmental governance become effective, without violating political, individual, and social rights?

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 119.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    For instance, some predicted that only a fascist state could meet the challenges of effectively regulating environmental pollution. According to William Ophuls in the initial edition of his darkly foreboding “Ecology and the Politics of Scarcity”, published in 1977, “[t]he golden age of individualism, liberty and democracy is all but over.” Garrett Hardin, author of the widely influential essay “The Tragedy of the Commons” in 1968, similarly contended that what was needed was a “world government that is sovereign in reproduction matters” and went on to claim that “injustice is preferable to total ruin.” Still others, while less pessimistic about democracy’s capacity to embrace the necessary legal regime, were confident that such revolutionary strides could occur only with the rise of a “Green Party” championing such a cause.” RICHARD J. LAZARUS, THE MAKING OF ENVIRONMENTAL LAW 2 (The University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London 2004), with reference to JOHN BROOKS FLIPPEN, NIXON AND THE ENVIRONMENT 214 (2000). Since the last decades, writers foresee a potential conflict between democratic governments and scientific governance due to the rising scarcity of natural resources. They wonder whether democracies will be sufficiently supple to respond to warning signals that resource-producing systems are stretched thin and in danger of collapse; these scholars express the fear that, at some point in the future, overuse of resources, overpopulation, or environmental degradation will force a choice between resource degradation due to open access and overuse of resources, making democracy untenable in the future. Bryan G. Norton, Democracy and Environmentalism – Foundations and Justifications in Environmental Policy, in DEMOCRACY AND THE CLAIMS OF NATURE – CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES FOR A NEW CENTURY 11, 23 (Ben A. Minteer & Bob Pepperman Taylor eds., Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., Lanham, Boulder, New York, Oxford 2002); Bruce Hannon, World Shogun, 8 JOURNAL OF SOCIAL AND BIOLOGICAL STRUCTURES 329-41 (1985); ROBERT HEILBRONER, AN INQUIRY INTO THE HUMAN PROSPECT (Norton, New York 1974); WILLIAM OPHUS, ECOLOGY AND THE POLITICS OF SCARCITY: A PROLOGUE TO A POLITICAL THEORY OF THE STEADY STATE (Freeman, San Frascisco 1977); WILLIAM OPHULS, THE POLITICS OF SCARCITY REVISITED: THE UNRAVELLING OF THE AMERICAN DREAM (Freeman, New York 1992); D. Ludwig, R. Hilburn, & C. Walters, Uncertainty, Resource Exploitation, and Conservation: Lessons from History, 260 SCIENCE 17-19 (April 2, 1993). Other scholars see democracy itself as a threat to environmental values and hold that democracy can be a threat to environmental values, since democracy is necessary, but not sufficient to protect the integrity of nature, and, thus, democracy should be “supplemented” by “second-order principles”, which are based on a “law of peoples” and will override any democratic process. See, e.g., LAURA WESTRA, LIVING IN INTEGRITY: A GLOBAL ETHIC TO RESTORE A FRAGMENTED EARTH 57 (Lanham, Md, Rowman & Littlefied 1998).

  2. 2.

    Giandomenico Majone, Controlling Regulatory Bureaucracies: Lessons from the American Experience 41 (1993) (EUI Working Paper SPS No. 93/3) (Badia Fiesolana, San Domenico (FL): European University Institute, Florence, Department of Political and Social Sciences).

  3. 3.

    See, e.g., J. H. H. Weiler, The Transformation of Europe, 100 YALE L. J. 2403, 2462 (1991).

  4. 4.

    See Christian Joerges, “Good Governance” through Comitology?, in EU COMMITTEES: SOCIAL REGULATION, LAW AND POLITICS (Joerges, Christian & Ellen Vos. eds. 1999); Shaping European Law and Policy: The Role of Committees and Comitology in the Policy Process, in POLICY PROCESS (Pedler & Schafer eds.) Extensive relevant literature exists on the regulation of competitions, as well. Renaud Dehousse, Misfits: EU Law and the Transformation of European Governance, (2000) (Working Paper) (New York University, School of Law, Jean Monnet Program).

  5. 5.

    Susan Rose - Ackerman, European Administrative and Regulatory Reform: Introduction to the Special Issue, 4 COLUM. J. EUR. L. 493, 493 – 98 (1998).

  6. 6.

    Patricia Popelier, Evidence-Based Lawmaking: Influences, Obstacles and the Role of the European Court of Human Rights, in Procedural Review in European Fundamental Rights Cases 79–94 (Janneke Gerards & Eva Brems eds., 2017).

  7. 7.

    As, for example, DG Agriculture, DG Competition, DG Economic and Financial Affairs, DG Energy and Transport, and DG Environment.

  8. 8.

    These include among others the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), Eurostat, Press and Communication, Publications, Translation Service, Legal Service, Personnel and Administration, the Policy Advisor’s Group, the Joint Research Center, and the Secretariat General of the Commission.

  9. 9.

    For the specifics of the organization and internal decision-making process of the Commission, see, among others, Laura Cram, The European Commission as a Multi-Organization: Social Policy and IT Policy in the EU, 1 JEPP 195 (1994); J. Fitzmaurice, THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION, IN MAASTRICHT AND BEYOND, BUILDING THE EUROPEAN UNION 181 (A. Duff et al. eds, Routledge 1994).

  10. 10.

    Rometch and Wessels have elaborated four models featuring the relationship between the Commission and the Council: the Commission as a dynamic technocracy with the Council as the body required to ratify Commission action, the Commission as a form of federal government, with the Council as the second chamber, the Commission as an expert secretariat and the Commission as a broker and negotiator within the Council. Rometch & Wessels, The Commission and the Council of Ministers, in THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION 203 (G. Edwards & D. Spence eds., Longman 1994). These models may infuse into each other and as Westlake comments, they are of relevance, depending on the context and on the time in the Community’s history. M. WESTLAKE, THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION 336 (Cartermill 1995).

  11. 11.

    See, however, other cases, e.g., Article 67 (ex. Art. 73(0)) EC dealing with visas, asylum, immigration.

  12. 12.

    See archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20120307054300/http://european-convention.eu.int/glossary.asp?lang=EN&content=C (last accessed January 2019).

  13. 13.

    Article 250(1) of the Consolidated TEC provided “Where, in pursuance of this Treaty, the Council acts on a proposal from the Commission, unanimity shall be required for an act constituting an amendment to that proposal, subject to Article 251(4) and (5)”.

  14. 14.

    Article 293(1) TFEU provides ―Where, pursuant to the Treaties, the Council acts on a proposal from the Commission, it may amend that proposal only by acting unanimously, except in the cases referred to in paragraphs 10 and 13 of Article 294, in Articles 310, 312 and 314 and in the second paragraph of Article 315‖.

  15. 15.

    Youri Devuyst, The European Union’s Institutional Balance After the Treaty of Lisbon: “Community Method” and “Democratic Deficit” Reassessed, 39 GEO. J. INT’L L. 247, 265 (2008);

    See Consolidated version of the Functioning of the Treaty on the European Union, available at https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex%3A12012E%2FTXT (last accessed January 2019).

  16. 16.

    Youri Devuyst, The European Union’s Institutional Balance After the Treaty of Lisbon: “Community Method” and “Democratic Deficit” Reassessed, 39 GEO. J. INT'L L. 247, 265 (2008) at 266.

  17. 17.

    Youri Devuyst, The European Union’s Institutional Balance After the Treaty of Lisbon: “Community Method” and “Democratic Deficit” Reassessed, 39 GEO. J. INT'L L. 247, 265 (2008) at 266.

  18. 18.

    Case 25/70, Koster [1970] ECR 1161.

  19. 19.

    Council Framework Decision Dec. 87/373, [1987] OJ L197/33. See Andrew Evans, European Union, Decision-making, Third States and Comitology, 47 INT'L & COMP. L.Q. 257 – 277 (1998); Peter L. Lindseth, Democratic Legitimacy and the Administrative Character of Supranationalism: The Example of the European Community, 99 (3) COLUM. L. REV. (April 1999).

  20. 20.

    Council Decision laying down the Procedures for the Exercise of Implementing Powers Conferred on the Commission, Dec. 99/468, [1999] OJ L184/23.

  21. 21.

    For a more detailed description of the Comitology process, see PAUL GRAIG & GRAINNE DE BURCA, EU LAW, TEXT, CASES, AND MATERIALS 150 (3rd ed., Oxford University Press 2003).

  22. 22.

    Rothmans, Benson & Hedges Inc. v. Saskatchewan (2002), 287 W.A.C. 121, 227 Sask. R. 121, 2002 SKCA 119 [Rothmans].

  23. 23.

    Communication of the Commission on the Institutional Architecture, COM(2002)728 (5 December 2002), available at https://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regdoc/rep/1/2002/EN/1-2002-728-EN-F1-1.Pdf (last accessed January 2019).

  24. 24.

    Art. 290 par. 2 of the TFEU.

  25. 25.

    Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council, Implementation of Article 290 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union available at https://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=COM:2009:0673:FIN:EN:PDF (last accessed January 2019).

  26. 26.

    COM (2010) 83 final, available at http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2009_2014/documents/com/com_com(2010)0083_/com_com(2010)0083_en.pdf (last accessed January 2019).

  27. 27.

    A White Paper on European Governance, July 25 2001, available at https://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/sites/devco/files/communication-white-paper-governance-com2001428-20010725_en.pdf (last accessed January 2019).

  28. 28.

    A White Paper on European Governance, July 25 2001, available at https://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/sites/devco/files/communication-white-paper-governance-com2001428-20010725_en.pdf (last accessed January 2019), at 24.

  29. 29.

    See GIULIANA ZICCARDI CAPALDO, THE PILLARS OF GLOBAL LAW 96 (Ashgate, Hampshire, England, Burlington, VT, USA, 2008); Philipp Pattberg & Oscar Widerberg, Theorising Global Environmental Governance: Key Findings and Future Questions, 43 Millennium: Journal of International Studies 684–705 (2015).

  30. 30.

    See, e.g., S. Jasanoff, Contested Boundaries in Policy-Relevant Science, 17 SOCIAL STUDIES OF SCIENCE 195 – 230 (1987); S. Funtowicz & J. Ravetz, Science for the Post-Normal Age, 25 FUTURES 739 (1993); L. Levidow, S. Carr, D. Wield, & von R. Schomberg, European Biotechnology Regulation: Farming the Risk Assessment of a Herbicide-Tolerant Crop, 22 SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND HUMAN VALUES 472 (1997); Erik Millstone, Can Food Safety Policy-Making be Both Scientifically and Democratically Legitimated? If so, how? 20 JOURNAL OF ARGICULTURAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS 483-508 (2007).

  31. 31.

    See, among others, ATHENA DEBBIE EFRAIM, SOVEREIGN (IN)EQUALITY IN INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS 28 (2000), p. 39 and seq.

  32. 32.

    D. Bodansky, The Legitimacy of International Governance, A Coming Challenge for International Environmental Law?, 93 AM. J. INT‘L L. 596 (1999). See also Robert C. Dahl, Can International Organizations be Democratic? A Skeptic’s View, in DEMOCRACY’S EDGES 19 (Ian Shapiro & Casiano Hacker-Cordon eds. 1999).

  33. 33.

    David. D. Caron, Protection of the Stratospheric Ozone Layer and the Structure of International Environmental Lawmaking, 14 HASTINGS INT'L & COMP. L. REV. 755 (Symposium Issue, 1991); Tarlock also holds the same; See Dan Tarlock, Slouching toward Eden: The Eco-pragmatic Challenges of Ecosystem Revival, 87 MINN. L. REV. 1173 (2003) at 1206.

  34. 34.

    See C. MUKERJI, A FRAGILE POWER, SCIENTISTS AND THE STATE (Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ 1989).

  35. 35.

    Concerning efficacy as a key component of legitimacy, see MAX WEBER, ECONOMY AND SOCIETY: AN OUTLINE OF INTERPRETIVE SOCIOLOGY 953 (Guenther Roth & Claus Wittich eds., Bedminster Press 1968).

  36. 36.

    See Daniel C. Esty, Legitimizing Supranational Governance: The Role of Global Administrative Law, in GLOBAL ADMINISTRATIVE LAW CONFERENCE 34 (NYU, 2005). But see, others that would deny that such neutral expertise is possible, such as Donald Braman & Dan M. Kahan, More Statistics, Less Persuasion: A Cultural Theory of Gun-Risk Perceptions 9 (2001) (Yale Law School, Public Law Research Paper No. 05).

  37. 37.

    ALVAREZ, INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS AS LAW-MAKERS, OXFORD MONOGRAPHS IN INTERNATIONAL LAW 101 (Oxford University Press 2005), quoting J. H. H. Weiler, The Transformation of Europe, 100 YALE L.J. 2403, 2468-9 (1991).

  38. 38.

    See Thomas M. Franck, Fairness in the International Legal and Institutional System, 240 HR 13, Chapter III (1993); THOMAS M. FRANCK, FAIRNESS IN INTERNATIONAL LAW AND INSTITUTIONS 24 (Oxford 1995).

  39. 39.

    Daniel C. Esty, Legitimizing Supranational Governance: The Role of Global Administrative Law, in GLOBAL ADMINISTRATIVE LAW CONFERENCE 35 (NYU, 2005), citing William N. Eskridge, Jr. & John Ferejohn, The Article I, Section 7 Game, 80 GEORGETOWN L.J. 523 (1992).

  40. 40.

    DAVID KENNEDY, INTERNATIONAL LEGAL STRUCTURES 293 (1987) (arguing that the authority of the international legal order comes from its “overall systematic image”).

  41. 41.

    Inis L. Claude, Collective Legitimization as a Political Function of the United Nations, 20 (3) INT'L ORG. 367-379 (1966). According to the author, the United Nations has developed and its role in world affairs has been adapted to the necessities and possibilities created and the limitations established by the changing realities of international politics. Collective legitimization has emerged as one of its major political functions. The world organization has come to be regarded, and used, as a dispenser of politically significant approval and disapproval of the claims, policies, and actions of States, including, but going far beyond, their claims to status as independent members of the international system.

  42. 42.

    See also Daniel C. Esty, Legitimizing Supranational Governance: The Role of Global Administrative Law, in GLOBAL ADMINISTRATIVE LAW CONFERENCE, NYU (2005).

  43. 43.

    David A. Wirth, Reexamining Decision-Making Processes in International Environmental Law, 79 IOWA L. REV. 769, 798 (1994), emphasizing “procedural integrity” as a basis for legitimacy. Eyal Benvenisti, The Interplay Between Actors as a Determinant of the Evolution of Administrative Law in International Institutions, in LAW & CONTEMPORARY PROBLEMS 7.

  44. 44.

    David A. Wirth, Reexamining Decision-Making Processes in International Environmental Law, 79 IOWA L. REV. 769, 798 (1994). See also THOMAS M. FRANK, THE POWER OF LEGITIMACY AMONG NATIONS (1990).

  45. 45.

    See, e.g., THOMAS M. FRANCK, THE POWER OF LEGITIMACY AMONG NATIONS (Oxford 1990).

  46. 46.

    NICKLAS LUHMANN, LEGITIMATION DURCH VERFAHREN 11-26 (1969).

  47. 47.

    JÜRGEN HABERMAS, 1 THE THEORY OF COMMUNICATIVE ACTION 287 (Thomas Mc Carthy trans. 1981).

  48. 48.

    HABERMAS, MODERNITY AND LAW (Mathieu Deflem ed., Philosophy and Social Criticism series, Sage Publications, London, California, India 1996).

  49. 49.

    See M. JÄNICKE & H. WEIDNER, SUCCESSFUL ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY: A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF CAPACITY-BUILDING (Berlin, Springer 1997).

  50. 50.

    See MICHAEL MASON, ENVIRONMENTAL DEMOCRACY 65; David J. Gerber, Two Forms of Modernization in European Competition Law, 31 (5) FORDHAM INT’L LAW JOURNAL 1235 (2007).

  51. 51.

    Daniel C. Esty, Legitimizing Supranational Governance: The Role of Global Administrative Law, in Global Administrative Law Conference, NYU (2005), p. 42.

  52. 52.

    5 U.S.C. § 551 (2006).

  53. 53.

    Giandomenico Majone, Independence vs. Accountability? Non-Majoritarian Institutions and Democratic Government in Europe (1994) (EUI Working Papers in Political and Social Sciences) (European University Institute, Florence). Majone speaks of an EAPA accordingly to the model of the U.S. Federal Administrative Procedures Act (APA).

  54. 54.

    Kingsbury, B. Krisch N. & Steward B. R., The Emergence of Global Administrative Law (Draft Paper for the Global Administrative Law Research Project of the New York University School of Law) (2004). For further working papers and project documents, please, visit the project website, www.iilj.org (last accessed January 2019).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. European Institute of Law, Science and Technology, Athens, Greece

    Dionysia-Theodora Avgerinopoulou

Authors
  1. Dionysia-Theodora Avgerinopoulou
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Avgerinopoulou, DT. (2019). Science Expertise as a Legitimacy Basis for Lawmaking and Additional Bases of Legitimacy. In: Science-Based Lawmaking . Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21417-3_12

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21417-3_12

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-21416-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-21417-3

  • eBook Packages: Law and CriminologyLaw and Criminology (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation